Awesome Vanuatu

I am writing this as we leave the island of Tanna en route to Port Vila, the capital of Vanuatu.
My apologies for the length of this blog and the many photos—it has taken great discipline to cut the photos to the ones I have selected. I am also going to attempt to load a couple of short movie clips—this venture may or may not be successful.
We have had one of the most intense weeks of our sailing journey experiencing the exotic and primitive way of life that the people of Tanna still live.
We had a rough three day sail from Fiji and were happy to arrive in Port Resolution on the beautiful island of Tanna Vanuatu. An Australian boat anchored nearby came over to let us know the check in procedure. As it was Friday we would be able to wait until Monday to take the apparently bumpy road over to Lenakel on the other side of the island to check in. Meanwhile the locals here who are very relaxed would have no problem with us coming ashore.
The next morning Al and Karen—the Australians--had been invited to a kastom ceremony; not a typo--bislama is the common language of Vanuatu which is basically pigeon English—as we found out if you phonetically read notices you would at least get the gist of the message. We decided to tag along so the following morning walked into the village consisting of thatched huts with dirt floors covered by woven mats. Unlike Fiji which was very sandy Tanna has an active volcano so the earth is full of ash and although appears very fertile makes for a very dirty living surface. There are many gardens with papaya and taro in abundance.
We were greeted with enthusiasm from everyone we met as they introduced themselves in generally very good English. They told us that the ceremony was at another village at the end of the bay and they would walk us there. Most of the women and a lot of children had their faces painted and were wearing grass skirts made from pandanus leaves. They carried a switch of dried leaves which we later found was to wave around when they are dancing.
Some of the women who were not dressed up are members of the Seventh Day Adventist church and are forbidden to dance. The missionaries had been in Tanna for some time when the islanders made the decision to go back to their old religion, a small number of people have stayed with some form of Christian faith.
The ceremony was one to celebrate the circumcision of the young boys. Boys from 5 to 12 year of age get circumcised (sometimes in the local hospital and sometimes by a local man (the equivalent of a medicine man I think). They then are looked after in seclusion in the bush by a number of “uncles” for three weeks and are not allowed any contact with any women—even their mothers.
At the end of this time they have the Kastom Dance for them. Firstly the men are with the boys for some time after which kava is drunk by all of the married men and when they feel the time is right will chant a song at which time the women are allowed to join them. For the rest of the day they dance and partake of food which has been prepared by the women of the local village who cook for several days before the event. They prepare lap lap which is a mixture of grated tapioca with some coconut milk spread on large banana leaves. Pieces of pork are layered in the middle then the whole thing is wrapped in more banana leaves and tied to cook on the embers of a fire. Many pigs are killed and cooked by the men feeding the large number of people who come in for the ceremony. People from villages as far away as five or six hours walk will come in for this and spend the night and walk home the next day.
The dancing consists of a group of men from a village who have a crown of fern or twisted plant on their heads who lead with chanting, stamping and moving to the centre of their circle. The chanting is reminiscent of the dance chants of the North American Indian. Once they warm up they will start jumping and running and highly colourful women waving the pandanus branches will surround them and jump along and sing with them. It is all done with great joy and laughter which appears to be generally the way of these happy people. There is a lot of energy expended and they all sweat profusely. We understand that these ceremonies happen regularly in all of the villages so you are able to go to them often. The next one is in our village on Friday.
We were greeted with huge smiles as they introduced themselves—they are not a particularly beautiful race of people—they are true Melanesians—but when they smile their eyes and faces light up and you can not help but smile back at them and feel very welcomed. They love having their photo taken and seeing the image on the display of the camera.
The dancing went on all day and after several hours we made our way back to our boat—we were still tired from our crossing from Fiji.
We spent Sunday wandering around the village with Miriam, a lovely local woman who laughs easily as she proudly showed us the beaches and local restaurants.
The locals are all barefootwith many wearing tshirts with logos obviously given by visiting tourists. All of the males from a very young age carry machetes and a lot of the boys carry catapults. They generally speak English well and some also speak French well also. The islands were jointly run by the English and French before independence in 1980 and both nations have left their marks.
We had lunch consisting of an omelette and some form of salad at the yacht club. This is a large grass hut with a dirt floor and tables and benches. There are a couple of old couches and some old magazines and a few books. It is the meeting place for tourists—as well as yachties. There are a number of bungalows (small grass huts) for tourists to stay in. Port Resolution is the closest main village to the very active volcano attracting tourists who fly to Lenakel and come across on the back of a truck for the 2 hour bumpy ride to the village. They will then be taken on another bumpy ride to the volcano.
The next morning we joined Chantel and Didier from a French boat which had arrived and Karen to go to Lenakel. We piled on the back of a 4 wheel drive pick up along with as many locals as could squeeze on and set off along the rough road to check in.
We dropped off a few soccer players on the way, Port Resolution has the championship team on Vanuatu and everyone plays soccer here. All the young boys have amazing ball control. Later, on our way back as we passed several players we learned that they had won 4-1 so great jubilation was shown on the back of the truck.
We passed the smoking Mt Yasur and when we stopped to take a photo we could hear the roar. We passed many people walking—most people have no access to vehicles and walk everywhere. They are going to the next village, to the soccer game, to or from the latest Kustom Ceremony or to or from the market.
We arrived in Lenakel and changed money—no ATM’s here but we had some NZ currency which we changed. Then to customs where after interpreting the notice on the door written by the “officer blong customs” we figured out that he was makem and sendum fax as well as various other jobs and he would be back soon.
After waiting a while we decided we would goem to the market and come back in a while. The market was typical of most of these countries with a wide variety of fruit and a fairly good selection of vegs available. One of the things we had not had before were peanuts still on their stalks so as we walked we munched on them. Another delicacy here is flying fox but we passed on that. The meat store had bags of pre-packaged beef with no refrigeration, apparently the beef here is great but we are still working our way through the last of the NZ meat so will wait. To have chicken you buy a live trussed one and deal with it yourself—will pass on that also for the moment!!! One of our happier discoveries was pamplemouse—the huge grapefruit we had had in the Marquesas, no one had come near to the amazing juice and flavour since—these proved to be as good.
We made our way back to the “officer blong customs”, he had returned and was happy to take our money and stamp our documents, the agriculture officer appeared missing so we decided to forgo that and deal with it later in Port Vila if necessary.
We had a fairly bland beef stew at a local restaurant with rice and salad and then the truck came to pick us up.
Now we had come to the complicated hour of the day---looking for our local passengers!!! No one seems to set up a meeting place or time so we proceeded to drive up and down the streets looking for everyone. When we would inquire if someone had seen a vital member of our group we would be directed back where we had come from as they had left already. This continued for 45 minutes or so and finally everyone was found and we now added huge bags of flour, live chickens, vegs and sundry other supplies to the already crowded back of the truck. Everyone is very happy and joking as they do this--it takes very little to set them off in hysterics. Finally we were all back on and made the 2 hour journey back to the village. A topic for amusement for them was when we had discussed that when we were going to the Cocos Islands and released the 2 marlin we caught as they were too big, they told us they thought we were crazy. As we came back it started to rain and this caused great hilarity as there was a huge bag of flour which may get wet. They do not stress about anything.
The next morning was the first of the cappuccino mornings on Cop Out with the French and Australian boats—they grow coffee on this island but it is very weak, my reputation for those morning cappuccinos still holds.
I got out my sewing machine and sewed Miriam’s 7 year old daughter 3 skirts—Miriam had some fabric but no machine and asked if I would sew them. I had no pattern only a waist and length measurement; we had bought some elastic in Lenakel. They turned out remarkably well and both Miriam and her daughter were delighted.
That afternoon we were to go to the volcano—presumably at 4pm. Chantel, Didier, Al, Karen were with us at the yacht club waiting but by the time the truck got back it was 5pm. They had taken in some yachties from 3 new boats which had arrived since Monday and of course they were late as they had had to drive around Lenakel looking for the locals to bring them home.
We now set off for our 45 minute bumpy ride on the back of the truck again to the volcano. It was dark when we got there which is the best time to view the pyrotechnics. As we hiked up the last 200 yards to the rim we could hear the hiss and roar and with red fire and rocks being spewed out of the crater. It was pretty scary but we could make out forms of people sitting on the rim so decided it must be safe. It was amazing to walk along the rim with no guide ropes in the pitch dark other than when the volcano was spewing glowing embers. You could hear both the booming and steam erupting. We were fairly unsuccessful with our photos but Chantel had a better camera so the photos on the blog and the slide show are hers. After a couple of hours we were herded off the mountain so the money collectors could go home and we returned with yet another bumpy ride to our boats.
The following morning we awoke to find a dugout canoe with Jimmy asking if we had some fuel for his small generator and then Tommy, his father wanted us to charge his cell phone. We obliged with both and shortly they returned with huge quantities of bananas, papaya and pamplemouse. We found here, if we offered or they asked for something they would give us a gift in return immediately. Unlike in Fiji where they seem to expect supplies from the cruisers and we had felt a little taken advantage of.
The next day our village was starting to prepare for their Kastom Ceremony which was to be held the following day for 4 of their local boys. All day the woman prepared the lap lap and men were carrying in the kava. A lot of pigs, a cow and a goat were butchered as they prepared for the many people who were coming in.
This ceremony was held in 2 parts; early in the morning there was dancing and the day was spent cooking food. At 4pm the men would go into an enclosure where no women were allowed to drink Kava and eat. The women and children would gather and eat together. There is no electricity on the island so once it is dark other than the occasional flashlight it is all in the dark.
Ken had heard that the kava on Tanna is the best to be had in Vanuatu which is far superior and stronger than Fiji kava so after talking to the villagers was invited to join the men. He and the men off the German boats and a couple of tourists showed up at 4pm and sat amongst some villagers. The local men and some boys proceeded to chew the kava root and put the chewed root in a sock of cheesecloth which they then poured water through to make the drink. This was accompanied with a lot of spitting and hawking as they cleared the roots from their mouths. None was allowed to talk during this time and Ken found it a little disconcerting wondering what strange diseased he may pick up during the kava drinking. He decided to bite the bullet and partook or 3 cups of kava and will blame any future medical issues on the experience. A flying fox was roasted on a stick but that was a little more than even he could handle.
Meanwhile I had stayed on the boat and picked up Karen to come in at 6 pm which is when we understood the women could join the men. We arrived to find that the eating was finishing and no one appeared to be ready for anything. They found a mat for us to sit on and offered us some lap lap—tough and tasteless—and some pork—delicious. We sat around wondering what was to happen. Miriam offered to paint our faces and I helped her paint hers as they could not find the mirror. It was pitch dark and it was all done with a flashlight. She told us that the men were wanting to drink the kava longer so it would be 7 30pm before the women were called, as all things Tanna time that ended up being 8 30 and then as all things Tanna time the women then started to get ready.
We walked there to find Ken and the other tourists had been left at 6pm as the men then went into a more secret place without outsiders. Finally at 9 15 they started dancing, as we were planning to leave in the morning and felt we had seen the best of the dancing in the daylight the previous Saturday we watched for a short time and went back to the boat.
As I write this we are sailing towards Port Vila—would have gone into Erramango first but the weather after tomorrow looks bad for several days and we would rather be stuck in Port Vila. We have no wind so are motoring along with the other boats we were anchored with, we have made water—the volcanic ash in the anchorage was too dirty to make it—and washed the worst of the dirt from our clothes.
Ken the mahi mahi king with his white and red rapella has just caught yet another mahi mahi—this at 55 inches and a broad male fish may be the biggest yet.
We look forward to our ongoing journey in Vanuatu but feel lucky that we have had such an amazing introduction to these magical islands.